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Explaining the decision, a council spokesman said: “A motion regarding the People’s Vote was submitted to full Council by Cllr Jacqi Hodgson. It was not debated by the council after our Monitoring Officer, in consultation with the Chairman of the Council, ruled it to be out of scope.

“This means that because the motion was not considered to relate to services that the council provided, commissioned or formally contributed to, then it was not appropriate for it to be debated by the Council.”

Devon for Europe campaigners had protested outside Follaton House, South Hams Council’s HQ, ahead of the meeting, as 52.9 per cent of South Hams residents in 2016 who voted in the referendum voted to remain in the EU.

South Hams protesters

Peter Sturdgess, Secretary of Devon For Europe, said: “I am hugely disappointed that my council has chosen to reject this opportunity to discuss the effects of Brexit on our local communities.”

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Cllr Hodgson added: “The two motions were asking the Council to object to the new government planning proposals to change the law and allow applications for Shale Gas Fracking to have ‘permitted development rights’ and by pass the proper planning system and avoid public consultation, and to ask them to support a Peoples Vote on Brexit.

"Both these requests were further to many members of the public approaching me and asking me to do this.

“The blatant refusal to allow motions put forward by the public that are about our fundamental democratic rights is astonishing.

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She added that her motion on fracking related to planning matters, strategic land-use policies and climate change matters, which the council has policies on, and the motion on Brexit related to democratic services and elections which the council administers on behalf of South Hams’ residents and therefore she felt were within the scope of the council.